"just thinking she can teach herself to fly"

therapy leaves me oddly dissatisfied these days, like i should be learning
more, or doing more, or getting more upset. but we're in a less drastic
sort of rebuilding now, i'm trying to coax the last pieces into place, where
once i used a sledgehammer.

which leaves me feeling sort of limp and uninteresting, much like my prose
feels these days.

there's always been more vaudeville in crazy.

everything is called something, kid. my upton tea order arrives, and
there are real little sugary hearts in the almond tea, and i can barely
drive anymore, because i can't seem to focus on multiple stimuli at once, my
eyes can only see one distance at a time, much like it makes me a little
nauseous to switch from looking at the tv to looking at the laptop. and
maybe it was always this bad, and it's only Light's coddling that gives me
room to notice.

i worry all the time about being not good enough, and i wonder what i could
do differently, to make people love me better or just plain respect me.
and maybe this is a holdover from being a drunk, and never knowing exactly
what i did in the times i don't remember, but i still can't assume that
things stay where i left them, particularly people's affections.

i used to have to talk myself down all the time when Light left an email
unresponded to, i assumed he'd come to his sense and left me, that something
i said had been misconstrued to give horrible offense. i, to this day,
don't understand my moments of panic, since people will or won't respond,
and if they come to hate me, or to not want to deal with me, then i can't do
anything about that.

there were a handful of leavetakings so far this year, for reasons probably
mostly unrelated to me, with one glaring exception. and the rate of loss
seems faster than the rate of gain, but only if i count it
person-for-person, rather than a larger picture of comfort given and lessons
learned. and though i am meticulous in much of my recordkeeping, i'm tired
of keeping track of this. if what support was given was withdrawn and it
hurts to have it so, maybe i should have tested the loadbearing properties
of the branch before i stepped out. while i can't make it all tidily my
fault, i can certainly try and put the internal sort of spin on the matter
where it's my fault for trusting instead of my fault for not falling high
enough on their hierarchy of needs and wants to merit attention or effort.

it's exhausting to need reassurance, and it's exhausting to spend all my
time keeping myself from asking for it, except for here, in my backwards,
backwards ways.

i want junkyard to come live in my basement, and girlbiscuit in my pocket,
and i want to run a shelter for wayward cats. i want to cook huge meals for
highly appreciative people, and i want be able to throw the alumni mag away
without opening it, rather than come crashing down when i see what stayed
intact when i couldn't, and how everyone saves the world but me. though i
don't really think the choice was between saving myself and saving the
world, but instead only between saving myself and not saving myself. i
want to not be allergic to the yellow dust, and i want to be okay with so
many things that i'm not okay with yet.

"just thinking she can teach herself to fly"

therapy leaves me oddly dissatisfied these days, like i should be learning
more, or doing more, or getting more upset. but we're in a less drastic
sort of rebuilding now, i'm trying to coax the last pieces into place, where
once i used a sledgehammer.

which leaves me feeling sort of limp and uninteresting, much like my prose
feels these days.

there's always been more vaudeville in crazy.

everything is called something, kid. my upton tea order arrives, and
there are real little sugary hearts in the almond tea, and i can barely
drive anymore, because i can't seem to focus on multiple stimuli at once, my
eyes can only see one distance at a time, much like it makes me a little
nauseous to switch from looking at the tv to looking at the laptop. and
maybe it was always this bad, and it's only Light's coddling that gives me
room to notice.

i worry all the time about being not good enough, and i wonder what i could
do differently, to make people love me better or just plain respect me.
and maybe this is a holdover from being a drunk, and never knowing exactly
what i did in the times i don't remember, but i still can't assume that
things stay where i left them, particularly people's affections.

i used to have to talk myself down all the time when Light left an email
unresponded to, i assumed he'd come to his sense and left me, that something
i said had been misconstrued to give horrible offense. i, to this day,
don't understand my moments of panic, since people will or won't respond,
and if they come to hate me, or to not want to deal with me, then i can't do
anything about that.

there were a handful of leavetakings so far this year, for reasons probably
mostly unrelated to me, with one glaring exception. and the rate of loss
seems faster than the rate of gain, but only if i count it
person-for-person, rather than a larger picture of comfort given and lessons
learned. and though i am meticulous in much of my recordkeeping, i'm tired
of keeping track of this. if what support was given was withdrawn and it
hurts to have it so, maybe i should have tested the loadbearing properties
of the branch before i stepped out. while i can't make it all tidily my
fault, i can certainly try and put the internal sort of spin on the matter
where it's my fault for trusting instead of my fault for not falling high
enough on their hierarchy of needs and wants to merit attention or effort.

it's exhausting to need reassurance, and it's exhausting to spend all my
time keeping myself from asking for it, except for here, in my backwards,
backwards ways.

i want junkyard to come live in my basement, and girlbiscuit in my pocket,
and i want to run a shelter for wayward cats. i want to cook huge meals for
highly appreciative people, and i want be able to throw the alumni mag away
without opening it, rather than come crashing down when i see what stayed
intact when i couldn't, and how everyone saves the world but me. though i
don't really think the choice was between saving myself and saving the
world, but instead only between saving myself and not saving myself. i
want to not be allergic to the yellow dust, and i want to be okay with so
many things that i'm not okay with yet.